“Hey, I ain’t stupid. I appeared disgruntled over having to live abroad and said that if I accepted the job, I would have to have more money.”
“What did he say?”
“A hundred dollars a week raise.”
In an orgy of excitement, they made love again. The hamburgers Debra had planned to serve for dinner were substituted with the smashed loaf of bread and the tepid bottle of wine. After they had demolished the last crumb and drained the last drop, they lay together on top of the scattered, crushed flowers and drowsily discussed their sunny future.
* * *
The move was a nightmare. There were passports and visas to obtain, weepy relatives to bid goodbye, and a million loose ends to tie up. Those responsibilities generally fell to Debra while Dillon was busy familiarizing himself with the unfinished project he had taken on. He was eager to get under way. As it turned out, he went to France ahead of Debra to make living arrangements and met her at Charles de Gaulle Airport three weeks later.
Leaving customs, she rushed into his arms and they held each other close. As he escorted her through the busy international airport, he told her repeatedly how much he had missed her.
“You can’t fool me, Burke,” she teased as they entered the parking garage. “You’ve probably gone through a score of French mistresses in the last three weeks.” Laughing, he ushered her toward a car. “Is this ours?” she asked incredulously.
“ ’Fraid so.”
“It’s so tiny.”
“That’s the only way you can survive the traffic over here. You’ve got to be able to slither through or you’re stuck for hours.”
She gauged the small interior against the length of Dillon’s legs. “Can you fit into that?”
“It’s a tight squeeze. As a result, there’s something I’ve got to tell you.” Solemnly he said, “I can no longer father children.”
Debra pressed her hand against his crotch. “As long as it still works, I don’t care.”
He was momentarily shocked by her public flirtation, but she reminded him that they were in France and that the French were famous for their tolerance of lovers.
He apologized to her for their apartment, which was on the third floor of a building with an elevator he didn’t trust and that he ordered her never to use. It was a narrow, drafty building with four apartments on each floor. “It was the best I could do,” Dillon said regretfully as he unlocked the door and swung it open. “Everything here is so expensive.”
What he found antiquated and inconvenient, Debra dubbed quaint and charming. “We’ve got a balcony!” she exclaimed, rushing toward the window and pushing open the shutters.
“Not a very good view, though.”
The balcony looked down over a sadly neglected courtyard. Within weeks, however, there were primroses blooming from the window boxes Debra had installed. She covered the cracks in the interior walls with colorful travel posters and made casual slipcovers out of bedsheets to hide the tackiness of the furniture, which had come with the apartment. It soon became a home that Dillon wouldn’t have traded for the nearby Versailles Palace.
On weekends, native Parisians made an exodus to the country, leaving the city to tourists like the Burkes. They parked their car on the outskirts of the city and used the Metro. Soon they became expert at negotiating its multilayered, underground stations. Like hungry gourmands at a feast, they consumed everything French. They fell in love with the sights, smells, and sounds of the City of Lights. They haunted the museums, parks, and historically significant public buildings, and discovered hideaway cafes where even Americans were charged fair prices for exquisite meals.
Cathedrals with windows of stained glass were dark sanctuaries where they sought privacy to kiss instead of pray. American hotdogs paled in comparison to those sold in Montmartre alongside original paintings.
To celebrate their first wedding anniversary, they spent a long weekend in the wine country, sampling the local vintages until they grew maudlin, and sleeping in small hotels where the featherbeds were as thick and sumptuous as the sauces served in the intimate dining rooms.
But there was a serpent in their paradise.
His name was Haskell Scanlan. Dillon’s title was supervising engineer in charge of construction. Haskell handled business matters—payroll, purchasing, and bookkeeping. They had met briefly in Tallahassee. Dillon had hoped that his first impression of the man would change once they got to France. For Debra’s sake he had hoped they could be friends with Haskell and his wife.
Unfortunately, Haskell Scanlan turned out to be as big a pain in the ass on foreign soil as on domestic. None of the construction workers could stand him. An unmerciful timekeeper, he docked their pay if they clocked in thirty seconds late. When the foreman approached Dillon about a pay increase, he took what he believed to be a fair request to Haskell Scanlan. Haskell adamantly refused even to consider it.
“For Chris’ sake, give them the raise!” Dillon shouted after a half-hour of heated argument.
“Across the board?”
“Across the board.”
“That’ll only encourage them to ask for more later on.”
“Hell, Haskell, they’re only asking for what amounts to twenty cents an hour.”